


Endless

by LadyAJ_13



Category: Endeavour (TV)
Genre: Insecurity, Jealousy, M/M, Post-Coital, Weird time frame because we have Peter Jakes referencing George Fancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-10
Updated: 2020-04-10
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:27:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23575387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyAJ_13/pseuds/LadyAJ_13
Summary: He thought falling into this again would help.It hasn’t.
Relationships: Peter Jakes/Endeavour Morse
Comments: 10
Kudos: 33





	Endless

**Author's Note:**

> Guardianoffun wrote a lovely fic 'Adventures in Ikea Furniture' which had very little dialogue but a lot happening in the details, and I wanted to try my hand at that. This is the result, I guess you can judge how well I've done!

He thought falling into this again would help.

It hasn’t.

It’s still there, as he catches his breath. He shouldn’t care this much either way, but if he doesn’t say anything it’ll fester, right beneath his ribcage, rearing up each time he opens his mouth until they slide backwards into their snappy, jealous fighting. 

The covers move, dragging over his bare skin as Morse stretches and twists to lie flat. He moves like a cat, all sensual slowness in the late afternoon sunlight, one hand drifting up to push hair from his face. 

Peter watches a cobweb in the corner of the ceiling. It sways in an invisible breeze. “So, you and the doctor.” He didn’t think he was as unfit as this, but it’s still an effort to bring in air. 

“Debryn?” Like there’s another doctor he could be talking about. “What about him?”

What about him? What about the relaxed way they stand near each other, the little smiles, the in-jokes and references and above all - above all that - the way they fit. Morse and him don’t fit. They’re two coppers, that’s all, too similar with bony angles and sharp edges that clash as much as they catch.

He shrugs. “It’s fine, Morse,” he says airily, sweat still sticking to his thighs. God, he needs a shower. Clean water and distance from the fey, wild, sleepy creature he’s let into his bed. He needs distance. He rolls, sitting up, and searches for his towel. “You were just…” his mind blanks, skipping frantically, a whirring that’s going nowhere. “Handy.” 

_ Handy. _ Oh, it’s careless enough, but synonymous with  _ easy _ . And Morse is anything but that. He might have slipped beneath clothes readily enough but that’s where the simplicity runs out. Anyone, he could have chosen for this. Any nameless, faceless person - or Strange, or Fancy - although the very thought rebels in his mind. He can’t imagine Strange's large hands running over him, or Fancy’s clumsy embarrassment, not the way he could always picture Morse’s ever moving fingers playing him like a piano. More grace, he was sure, than they ever possessed over a typewriter.

He was right on the money there. 

But the  _ point _ \- the point is he could have had anyone. He knows the places to go, the faces that catch on his, the right nods and winks and ways to angle his body until they follow him home and he can tip them into his sheets. But he didn’t. He took Morse. Again and again until he knows the places to bite and the places to suck, and somehow he’s grown addicted to this version of him. He took Morse thinking he’d be fumbling, at first, awkward and all elbows - but he wasn’t. This is where he finds his cocky confidence, it turns out, smoothing away the edges until he’s just a firestorm of focus, of sure hands and a hot, wet mouth, leaning above until there’s no choice but surrender.

Peter’s taken leave of his bloody senses. Just once more, his brain rattles, over and over again until the words lose all meaning; a mantra without matter.

Morse darkens, head lifting from where it was pillowed on long arms. His eyes narrow, lip curling. “Oh.”

He stands and finds his towel hiding, slung over the chair. The fabric is thin and mildly damp; it could do with a wash. He grips it too tightly with his back to Morse, ears pricked as rustling belies sheets being pulled back, clothes being pulled on. The chink of a metal buckle and the soft thud of shoes dropped to be unlaced. His skin prickles in lonely nakedness. He can’t walk away. 

“Not handy,” a voice says gruffly, unfamiliar. It’s only the reverberation in his throat that reveals it was him. He coughs. “But, you know. Debryn.”

“I don’t know what you’re so hung up on Max for.”

Max. He closes his eyes, a long blink he’s unwilling to break.  _ Max. _

“Whatever. When you get out of this snit, I’ll see you at work.”

He nods, and shivers in the draught as Morse throws the covers straight. That’s that then. Nothing but cooled sweat on his skin and sheets that could do with a change, the subtle scent of Morse’s soap bled into their weave. He won’t change them. He’ll lie in the memory until it fades away. 

Rough lips brush his cheekbone, and his eyes snap wide. Morse meets his gaze, brow furrowed and jaw tight, then steps back. He nods, terse but distracted, fiddling with the button of his jacket like they’re parting at the end of a shift.

And Peter knows: that once-more mantra plays rhythms that echo Morse’s footsteps as he walks away, door clicking shut and shoes tapping on flat block stairs.

He’ll fall again. 


End file.
